Various application programs are needed in accordance with the data types because different data types such as text, tables, and images require different structures for defining these data and different editing operations for these data. The user must use different applications for different data types: a word processing program for editing of texts, a spreadsheet program for editing of tables, and an image editing programs for editing of images.
The user generally uses an application program corresponding to each data type. However, a document to be created by the user is not usually a document made up of only one type of data such as only text, tables, or images, but a document made up of a plurality of data types such as text and tables or characters and images. In order to create a target document containing a plurality of data types, the user utilizes the print functions of various applications, prints data by using the applications, and manually combines printed materials into a desired order.
A program called “Office Suite”, which forms one integrated application from various applications, provides a function of combining data generated by respective applications into one document. The use of the integrated application allows the user to combine data created by respective applications into one target document by using a specific application included in the integrated application.
There is proposed a document processing system which holds data for each page, and lays out and prints data on a paper sheet in accordance with various setting values. In this system, data are held within a hierarchical structure, but setting values are held for only an entire document, thus partial settings are impossible. For example, there is a printing system capable of layout setting (to be referred to as N-page printing, Nin1 printing, or N-page layout) of arranging N pages (N is, e.g., two, four, nine, or 16) on one surface of one sheet of a document created by an application program or the like. Taking N-page printing as an example, 2-page printing can be set for an entire document, but part of the document having the 2-page printing designation cannot be changed to 4-page printing. That is, one setting item cannot be set to a setting value different from that of an entire document for part of the document. In a system capable of setting the layout and the like for each part of a document, attributes (setting values of the layout and the like) are held for only each part, and cannot be simultaneously changed at once throughout the entire document.
In this environment, a document processing system has been introduced in which document data are hierarchically held as a page, a set of pages, or an entire document, and the values of various setting items are also held for each layer of the document data (see Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-162404). This system can realize both a single setting for an entire document and partial settings for parts of the document.
As an editing operation, this system can change the setting value of each setting item, and can also move, copy, and paste an arbitrary unit such as a page or a set of pages within or outside a document. This system also has a function of previewing the state of document data at the end of a printing process, presenting the preview display to the operator, and prompting him to perform editing operations. In the document processing system, when a document is output (e.g., displayed or printed), each page within the document is output in a format corresponding to settings of the entire document and the settings of each page. Setting contents include a setting for printing different pages on one sheet, like N-page printing, and a page repeat printing function of copying the same page a number of times on one sheet, and displaying and printing the result. A layout implemented by this page repeat printing function will be called a page repeat layout.
Page repeat printing (page repeat layout) is a function premised on cutting after printing. Page repeat printing is a function of laying out the same page by a number of times on one paper sheet and printing the result in order to output the printed results of copies on one paper sheet. Most page repeat printing functions output a printed material so as to obtain an original page by simply equally cutting a paper sheet instead of cutting a paper sheet into an arbitrary page size with a register mark. For document data in which N-page printing and the page repeat layout are simultaneously set, the cut line is confusing during post printing editing and cutting.
An error occurs when the preview display of document data having the page repeat layout setting enables page selection and an editing process for respective images of identical pages which are laid out on one sheet surface. This is because identical pages laid out on one sheet in the page repeat layout do not exist as entities in document data but are merely copies for printing. This is different from the preview display of a general N-page printing layout. In editing a document, the page repeat layout setting must be canceled, or even if the page repeat layout is set, a document must be previewed as if no page repeat layout were set.
In the document processing system which permits the page repeat layout setting, the productivity decreases in outputting a document having the page repeat layout. The operability of editing operations is poor for a document having the page repeat layout. Further, it is difficult to accurately express the format of an actual output material of a document having the page repeat layout setting on the preview display. This also leads to poor operability of the editing operation and low productivity.